AirAsia India will be introducing capital into the company shortly and by the end of 2017 the company will be in a position to take off on international routes. This infusion of fresh capital plus the planned overseas operations will help make the airlines profitable. According to a new rule, a domestic airline can fly overseas if they deploy either 20 planes or 20 per cent of their total capacity for local operations.

AirAsia India is co-owned by Tata Sons and AirAsia Malaysia with 49 per cent shares each. Tata group veterans, S Ramadorai and R Venkataramanan, hold the remaining two per cent. The fleet currently boasts of six Airbus A320 aircraft and the management plans to raise this to 20 by 2017-end. With a market share of 2.2 per cent, the airlines operated 40 daily flights with Bengaluru and Delhi as the base.

The airline’s board has come out with a rights offer of Rs 234 crore. The money will help the airline increase its national presence and also start its footprints in the international arena. The company brought down its loss to Rs 7.86 crore in the quarter ended 31 March 2016 from the loss of Rs 31 crore during the same period last year.

The Group CEO of Malaysia’s Air Asia Berhad, Tony Fernandes, was recently given the Overseas Citizenship of India Status, which is similar to the Non-Resident India status. This change in status will allow him 100 per cent shareholding in Indian carriers through automatic route. Based on this Tony had also announced that he was willing to buy out the Tatas.

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